Storm Killer (12 page)

“At the time of the guidance system worm incident, where were you?”

Brad thought for a moment. “Why, home sleeping. The Doctor had given me a cold medication that knocked me out for a few hours. The damned stuff hasn’t helped my cold much.”

Kim asked another dozen questions and told Brad that he would remain a suspect until she either proved his guilt or innocence.

As she got to the door, she turned and said, “Brad, I have one more question. I know this is very personal but I need to know. Have you had sexual relations with anyone on the station the last few months? I promise I will be discrete with the information.”

Brad looked somewhat embarrassed. “Yes. But I am not giving her name to you. There are some things that are...”

Kim cut him off. “Brad, you can either tell me and help me, or I will find out other ways. And you know I will find out. So what’s it going to be? Be the southern gentleman and protect the lady’s good name while hindering the investigation, or aid my investigation and come clean. Now!”

Brad appeared even more embarrassed. “Kim, you know my wife is due to arrive here next month. If she found out, my marriage would be over. I don’t want that. Please understand.”

“Brad, I don’t want to hurt any innocent party, and certainly not your wife. Your infidelity is between you two, but I need to know who would know your personal habits and know the card would be laying on the coffee table in easy reach of the door to your cubicle.”

Brad coughed and said, “There have been two women since I arrived here. The young Naval Ensign in the Control Center, Amanda Eads, is here every Tuesday night. And Francine Cruz, our station doctor, all but attacked me a few weeks ago and has been my bedmate several nights a week ever since then.”

Kim nodded and then she departed, leaving a very concerned Bolino.

When she returned to her temporary desk, an envelope was lying on top. It was addressed simply to Kim Danby and had been laser printed. Handling it by the corners, she opened it and removed the single sheet of paper on the inside.

The note was unsigned. It simply stated that the anonymous sender had information about the sabotage incidents that Kim would find ‘of great value’. She was instructed to come alone to Closet 21, the personnel safety shelter furthest from the inhabited area of the dumbbell. And be there within the hour.

She placed the envelope and sheet of paper in a plastic bag and sealed the bag. She then wrote a note explaining where she was going and placed it with the bag and locked it in her desk drawer. The note was addressed to Lt. James and outlined all of the new information she had from Bolino and the mysterious note. If anything happened to her, Lt. James would find the note and hopefully complete the investigation. She could have called him, but thought better of it. If she could get information that would lead to an arrest, her peers would be impressed, especially the lieutenant.

She went to the safe in the Security office and removed her .38/44 caliber police special. Checking the chamber, she reached into the safe and opened an ammunition box, removed six bullets and loaded the weapon. She put extra six rounds in her tunic pocket.

Regulations called for her to notify the Station Director when any security officer determined the need to carry one of their firearms. This was so the Director could notify emergency services to be ready for a ‘meteor intrusion’ drill. Using firearms in space usually led to holes being punched thorough the hull. The meteor intrusion drill was a test of the ability of an emergency team to seal hull breaches quickly. The team, knowing a drill was being planned, would keep the sealing equipment at hand.

She thought for a moment. It would not do to notify Bolino since he was still a suspect. She decided to inform Adam Sand and let him deal with it. She called Adam and informed him; using the excuse that Bolino was still ‘under the weather’ from his cold.

Locking the safe, she looked in her desk drawer and removed the bundle of nylon restraints and placed three in her pocket. Police favored this type of restraint over the traditional handcuffs due to availability of illegal handcuff keys on the street. Back in the early 2000’s, a prisoner arrested for assault, killed two Florida Highway Patrol officers in their car after he unlocked his handcuffs while being transported to the police station for interrogation. Following that incident, almost all restraint was done with the nylon straps.

She took a final look around the room and left for her rendezvous with the mysterious informant. She drove the security sled to the end of the dumbbell furthest from the elevators that brought people down from the reception area.

There were not yet any inhabitants in this end of the station. As new staff arrived and the station was opened up to their families, those families would be housed at this end of the station in dependent housing that was yet to be built. Currently, pallets of modular walls were being stored in an almost haphazard fashion around the area.

Several pallets shielded the entrance to Closet 21 from view.

Kim dismounted the sled and walked cautiously toward the emergency shelter entrance. She pulled her weapon as she neared the opening. The exterior lights near the entrance were out. The entrance was cast in gloom. She gave herself a moment to allow her eyes to adjust to the gloom. “Okay.” She muttered to her self, “On three I go in. One … Two …”

24

Francine was worried. If they found out about her affair with Brad Bolino, and her relationship with Rafael, they might put two and two together. If they figured out she had taken Brad’s security card and let Rafael use it, she was toast.

The affair had been all her idea. She liked Bradley a lot, and felt that both of them were very lonely and neither wanted a permanent or serious relationship. She had a solid relationship on the ground with a wonderful person who made her heart sing. He had a wife whose picture was always on Brad’s desk. But a little no-strings attached fun on the station would be okay. No one would know and no one would be hurt.

She never expected her brother to ask her to exploit her involvement with Brad. When he ordered her to steal Brad’s card, she had complied. He had threatened to make Brad’s wife aware of what was going on. Better to give in to Rafael’s demands than take a chance of having everything exposed.

Even if she said she had no idea what Rafael wanted with the card, the very act of taking it would make her guilty of being an accomplice in whatever Rafael was doing.

She needed to call in some favors. And confess to her Earth-side lover.

She scanned through her cell phone address book until she found the Earth-side number she wanted.  She selected the number and waited for it to connect. It rang twice at the other end and voice answered, “Hello?”

“Hi, it’s me. Francine. I need your help. I’m in trouble.” Francine blurted out. 

The voice responded in a soothing tone, “Now, now, calm down my dear. What’s wrong? How can I help?”

Francine launched into a lengthy summary of what she had done for her half-brother. She explained what was happening on the station at the moment and what she thought would happen to her when the security team delved into the facts. Her voice quivered with nervous energy and some fear as she described her role in Rafael’s plans.

The person at the other end of the phone listened quietly and didn’t interrupt Francine as she poured out her problems.

Francine hesitated and seemed unsure how to continue.

The voice asked, “Is there more?”

“Yes. But you’re not going to like it. You’ll probably hate me. You should hate me.” Francine replied.

“I could never hate you. I love you.” The voice stated.

“I --- I love you too. But you will never believe that after I tell you.” Francine sobbed into the phone.

“Tell me.” The voice ordered with some trepidation.

“I --- I slept with Brad Bolino.” Francine cried.

“You what? I thought we --- I mean, I thought you and I were…” The voice seemed to be struggling with Francine’s last admission. “How many times?

“Maybe eight or nine.” Francine admitted to the faraway voice.

The growing silence from the other end of the line was more than Francine could stand.

“It meant nothing! He was just a diversion. It’s so lonely up here. I feel so isolated with Rafael’s constant demands. I just wanted some companionship. I’m sorry!” Francine cried. 

“Okay Francine. We’ll talk about this whole affair thing when you get back to Earth. Is there anything else you need to tell me?” The voice said without a hint of emotion. 

Francine told of Rafael’s threats about Brad’s wife and his pushing her to steal Brad’s security card.  She continued until she brought the story completely up to date and then stopped.  

When Francine had finally rundown, the voice had responded. “How did you get yourself into such a position? I don’t know if I can do anything to get you out of this. Maybe I can do something. I don’t know. Let me work on it. Alright?” 

Francine replied, “Yes please! That’s why I called you. Maybe when the facts come out people will see I’m just a pawn in this too. Your so close to the President, maybe you can do something to persuade him to forgive me?”

“Alright Francine. I’ll do what I can.” The voice promised and hung up.

Francine was left with a dead phone line and a dying outlook on her chances for the future.    

25

“And three!” Kim finished her countdown and taking a deep breath, she crossed the threshold into Closet 21. The emergency lights came on as the sensors detected her movement. For a brief instance, the bright emergency lamps blinded her. An arm clamped around her neck and pulled her backward. At the same instance, a hand placed a wet cloth over her mouth and nose.

Surprised, Kim took a breath and immediately her head seemed to explode and she spiraled down into unconsciousness. Her last clear thought was,
I’m being drugged. Whatever it is has a pungent odor.
She struggled for a few seconds and went limp. The assailant struggled pulling Kim’s body deeper into the room.

The figure reached down and patted Kim’s body, stopping when the bulge of the gun was detected. The figure took the gun and threw it on a table close by. Continuing the pat down, the restraints were found and the extra ammunition removed. The assailant used the restraints to tie Kim’s hands behind her back and tie her ankles together.

The attacker checked Kim’s reactions by raising an eyelid and shining a flashlight into the eye, and measuring her pulse. Taking the wet anesthetic drenched rag, the figure placed it over Kim’s mouth and nose and held it there while Kim took three or four shallow breaths. Her breathing perceptibly slowed.

Throwing the rag on the table, the figure picked up the pistol and ammunition, tossed them into a black leather bag. Then, using a screwdriver, disabled the automatic sensor that controlled the interior lights. The room was plunged in darkness. The assailant checked the exterior and then exited, and closed the entrance door. The figure stopped, cursed a mild oath, and turned back to the room. The shadowy figure walked back to the table and picked up the rag used to knock out Kim. The rage was stuffed into the black leather bag as the figure exited the safety closet.  

The assailant walked to Kim’s security sled, reached in, and touched the auto-return function on the keypad. The sled moved away heading back to the garage at the base of the elevators at the other end of dumbbell. Buckling on a PPU, the assailant lifted toward Core City at the station’s weightless center.

The PPU only needed to fire for a second and the figure was moving upward toward the jungle of flying offices. Moving swiftly, the figure took off the PPU and hung it on a PPU rack at the first flying office encountered.

The assailant began moving along the center of the flying offices and soon merged with the normal public traffic and disappeared into the human hubbub.

26

The crystal-growing experimental laboratory was in the zero gravity point of Core City.

Crystals are grown by separating all the building block molecules into individual units in water and letting them fall naturally into their appropriate place in the repetitive structure as the water evaporates. By applying a low voltage direct electrical current to the water solution, the shape of the repetitive structure can be influenced and controlled.

Zero gravity allowed the experimenters to create precise molecular structures without the inherent problems caused by effects of gravity on the different structures being built in the electrical field.

Current experiments were creating a crystal knife blade one-molecule thick on its cutting edge. This was a sharper cutting edge than any current medical scalpel manufacturers could boast. And it could be made much cheaper than any of the currently produced medical scalpels.